As the wider public became more demanding of the ethical standing of the companies they bought from or dealt with, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) statements started to be added to annual reports and corporate web sites. Later, it became, certainly for UK companies, a legal requirement to report on a company’s impact on the community and the environment under various sections of the Companies Act 2006.
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In a lecture at the end of December, Lord Stern reiterated his message that the business community and politicians need to act, and act now, on carbon emissions if we are to avoid, what he termed, a catastrophe by the next century.

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As far back as the beginning of 2008, Gordon Brown supported the implementation of a nuclear energy strategy to go some way to meeting the challenges of climate change and the fast diminishing supply of carbon based energy resource, in the publication of the White Paper on Nuclear Energy (Meeting the Energy Challenge).
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Last week saw the great and the good (well, their lower level ‘mini-me’s’, anyway) gathering in Barcelona in a pre-Copenhagen summit.
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On the issue of Cemex and the River Avon.
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The theme of buildings, and their importance in the climate change and (more importantly) carbon reduction movement, has grown rapidly over the past six months.
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“Businesses in Northern Ireland are putting the rest of the UK to shame.”

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It appears that UK consumers are among some of the most aware and discriminating when it comes to spotting companies that are genuinely ethical and sustainable and those that are just ‘greenwashing’, as complaints to the ASA continue increase about companies that advertise one thing, but practice quite another.
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CSR, Sustainability, Environmental concern… these themes have been yo-yoing up and down the corporate agenda as client and stakeholder pressure mounts and eases – and it is not wholly unconnected with the multiple legislation streams that are gaining traction and taking their place in the list of levies, fines and taxes that are becoming a common-place consideration for companies of all sizes.
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The camel’s back has finally broken; nine years after being appointed by Tony Blair to the post of chairman of the Sustainable Development Commission (SDC), Sir Jonathon Porritt has finally had to accept that Gordon Brown has as little understanding of the importance of sustainability and its key role in the future viability of business in the UK (and globally) now, as he had when he was chancellor.
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